Following the path still backward, we come to something altogether different. _Romola_ is a historical romance on the grand scale. In the central background is the heroic figure of Savonarola, saintly but not impeccable; in the middle distance, a crowd of Renaissance people immersed in the rich and bloody turmoil of that age; in the foreground, the sharp contrast of two epic personalities—Tito Melema, the incarnation of smooth, easy-going selfishness which never refuses a pleasure nor accepts a duty; and Romola, the splendid embodiment of pure love in self-surrendering womanhood. The shameful end of Tito, swept away by the flooded river Arno and finally choked to death by the father whom he had disowned and wronged, has in it the sombre tone of Fate. But the end of the book is not defeat; it is triumph. Romola, victor through selfless courage and patience, saves and protects the deserted mistress and children of her faithless husband. In the epilogue we see her like _Notre Dame de Secours_, throned in mercy and crowned with compassion. Listen to her as she talks to Tito’s son in the loggia looking over Florence to the heights beyond Fiesole. “‘What is it, Lillo?’ said Romola, pulling his hair back from his brow. Lillo was a handsome lad, but his features were turning out to be more massive and less regular than his father’s. The blood of the Tuscan peasant was in his veins. “‘Mamma Romola, what am I to be?’ he said, well contented that there was a prospect of talking till it would be too late to con _Spirto gentil_ any longer. “‘What should you like to be, Lillo? You might be a scholar. My father was a scholar, you know, and taught me a great deal. That is the reason why I can teach you.’ “‘Yes,’ said Lillo, rather hesitatingly. ‘But he is old and blind in the picture. Did he get a great deal of glory?’ “‘Not much, Lillo. The world was not always very kind to him, and he saw meaner men than himself put into higher places, because they could flatter and say what was false. And then his dear son thought it right to leave him and become a monk; and after that, my father, being blind and lonely, felt unable to do the things that would have made his learning of greater use to men, so that he might still have lived in his works after he was in his grave.’ “‘I should not like that sort of life,’ said Lillo. ‘I should like to be something that would make me a great man, and very happy besides—something that would not hinder me from having a good deal of pleasure.’